What if you don't own a computer or a mobile device, or haven't yet learned how to navigate the web? What about enlisting a friend or family member?
Also, consider visiting your local library as it likely offers both free Internet access and web browser use training.
All you really need to get started is a basic lesson on how to use a web page search engine such as Google or Yahoo, how to move around or navigate a web page (a page selected from your search results), and how to print articles you wish to keep.
For starters, visit WhyQuit.com. To do so, simply move the mouse pointer to the address window at the top of the web browser page and delete the current address being displayed. Now, simply type "whyquit.com" in the address window and then press "enter" or "return."
Presto! Welcome to WhyQuit! The site is totally free, declines all donations, sells nothing, has no advertising, and is staffed entirely by volunteers.
Notice how WhyQuit's homepage is broken down into three categories: (1) Why Quit Smoking (motivation), (2) How to Stop Smoking (education), and (3) Help Quitting (support)
"Why Quit Smoking" motivation pages include heart-wrenching stories about young tobacco victims. For example, lung cancer was diagnosed when Noni was 32 years old and had just given birth to her first child, and when Bryan was 33 and enjoying his two-year-old son Bryan, Jr.
Visitors learn how the 33-year-old daughter of comedian Carol Burnett died. They meet Deborah who was 38 and her 11-year-old daughter, and Kim, a much-beloved member of Freedom who was 44, and her loving sister Kelly.
Clearly, WhyQuit intentionally shares horrific stories about the youngest of the young. We openly admit attempting to awaken smokers to the fact that predicting who tobacco toxins will kill, and at what age, is no different than playing Russian roulette with a loaded gun.
But with roughly one-quarter of adult lifetime smokers being claimed by their addiction during middle-age, young victim stories are far more common than smokers think.
The "How to Stop" link leads to Joel's Library, the 40+ years of cessation insights of my 20+ year mentor Joel Spitzer. Inside Joel's Library, you'll find links to more than 100 insightful stop smoking articles, to Joel's free ebook "Never Take Another Puff," to his daily recommended lesson guide, and links to Joel's more than 500 YouTube stop smoking videos.
"How to Stop" also leads to articles I've written, including this book. While full revisions to this book occur every few years, the most current and up to date version will always be available at WhyQuit in HTML webpage format. As new studies are released or insights change, this is where they'll be documented first.
The "Help Quitting" link provides links to support sites. For example, imagine being in the company of more than 13,000 cold turkey ex-users. Exclusively a cold turkey group, Turkeyville is WhyQuit's fast-moving Facebook support group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/whyquit
Managed by two of Joel's earliest online graduates, Joy Kauffman and Sallie Hamilton, Turkeyville posting privileges are reserved for those who have abruptly ended all use of nicotine.
I challenge you to find any Internet support group that's more focused, single-minded, serious, or productive than Turkeyville.
At both forum's you'll quickly notice that education always comes first. It must. Why? Because we discovered very early (1999-2000) that a forum's ability to support and sustain recovery in a purely pep-rally type environment ("You can do it!") is dismal at best.
While the initial excitement of interacting with other ex-users is often tremendous, it eventually begins to wane. As it does, the forum's value and effectiveness in supporting success diminishes.
We learned that when members have little or no education or recovery skills to fall back upon, that group relapse rates become horribly unacceptable (less than 10-15% at 6 months).
Visitors to Turkeyville need not join in order to read and benefit from the forum's messages. In fact, most don't. Still, our volunteers treat visitor emails and their Facebook messages as though they're part of the family.
Thus, Turkeyville functions as a virtual classroom with enormous windows. Maintaining positive control over membership and posting privileges ensures a high-quality classroom-type learning experience for all.
It also prevents chaos and makes sure that Turkeyville's seasoned volunteer educators aren't overwhelmed when a major newspaper, magazine or other media source features our work and we're flooded with membership requests.
Every message posted at Turkeyville must relate to recovery. General socialization isn't permitted, including the celebration of birthdays, anniversaries, or your nation's or religion's holidays.
Clearly, Turkeyville isn't for those seeking to socialize or make new friends. Nearly seven million tobacco-related deaths expected by year's end, the group is deadly serious about its mission. Our goal is simple: to aid all who visit in remaining nicotine-free today.
As for Turkeyville being a 100 percent nicotine-free support site, there must be at least one place on earth where nicotine has no voice. Those posting to the group are certifying to all that they stopped cold turkey without the use of any product or procedure and have remained 100% nicotine-free.
Although it may sound harsh, applicants must also agree to abide by Turkeyville's relapse policy. That policy states that should any member relapse that they lose group posting privileges. Obviously, the aim is to encourage members to take recovery seriously.
One final point. The rules also prohibit mention of any commercially sold book, product, diet, or procedure. Both forums were built and are rooted in the principle that cold turkey is 100% free, without cost or obligation, and with no purchases necessary.
As such, the forum will not permit any suggestion that any reader needs to spend any money or make any purchase in order to succeed, including purchasing the paperback version of this book.
If sharing links to FFN-TJH at any online site please only share the link to WhyQuit's free versions. Otherwise, expect your post to be deleted or edited.
As for deleted posts, please don't post at Turkeyville if you have not yet started your recovery, or if your attempt involves e-cigarette use, replacement nicotine, Chantix, Zyban, hypnosis, acupuncture, or any gradual nicotine weaning scheme, or if you've relapsed and are using again.
Not only will you force the group's volunteers to waste time and energy in enforcing the group's rules, you're also inviting needless frustration. There are many online support groups dedicated to other quitting methods.
Again, Turkeyville is a place where nicotine has no voice. To our thinking, to do otherwise would be no different than allowing alcoholics to come to AA meetings drunk, with their bottle in hand.
Recovery meters
Under "Help Quitting," WhyQuit provides visitors links to free stop smoking meters. These are small computer programs or applications (apps) that can either be downloaded to and installed on your computer, laptop, or mobile device, or used while online without any need for a download.
Once you type in your tobacco use history (how often you used, the purchase price and the day you stopped), most will calculate the number of days, months and years we've remained free, the amount of money you've saved, and if a smoker, the total number of cigarettes not smoked and the amount of life expectancy reclaimed to date.
Most meters also allow you to copy their calculations to your computer's clipboard for transporting and pasting into e-mails, documents created with your word processing program, or for sharing on Internet message boards.
And this is how nearly all online recovery calculators are used. You enter your use history, and then simply copy the calculated stats and paste them where you wish them to appear.
Here, I'm copying and pasting my stats as of September 2020, while using Harry's Quit Counter:
John - Free and healing for twenty-one years, four months and eight days while extending my life expectancy 1,625 days by avoiding the use of 468,131 nicotine delivery devices that would have cost me a minimum of $130,482.19.
Like a car's odometer, they're a fun way of tracking, marking, and measuring your journey home. Links to free meters can also be found at both Freedom and Turkeyville.
Support unlimited
It's my hope that the above online recovery support suggestions will stir your thinking. You are not confined to just WhyQuit. The only limit to identifying additional means of keeping our recovery dreams fueled and vibrant is the limits of our imagination.
And our objective here is simple. It's finding creative ways to stay sufficiently motivated for as long as it takes to get comfortable.
Remember, whether today is good or bad, whether feeling motivated or not, your freedom and healing are guaranteed to continue so long as you stick to one guiding principle ... no nicotine, none!
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Published in the USA